Personnel and communication issues can dog leaders in any field, and CIOs are no exception. Unlike a poor economy or other external factors however, these challenges are largely under the control of managers who can fix them, according to leadership coach John McKee.

There are three bits of advice that can help any leader improve communication and a team's performance, McKee writes in a post at TechRepublic. The first thing to do is ask more open-ended questions of your staff rather than acting as though you have all the answers. Chances are, the team collectively has more knowledge than you realize.

McKee's second tip is to establish balance in your life overall, and help your team establish balance too. Sleeping poorly or remaining preoccupied about personal troubles generally doesn't lead to top performance, so it doesn't pay to ignore one's life off the job. At the same time, be sure that your employees understand that they have to give 100 percent when they are on the job. 

Finally, McKee says, can the jargon and talk like a normal human. If you are having problems communicating, try just speaking in plain English before hiring a consultant to fix the problem. "Because they're not trying to impress us with lingo and complex terms to show how smart they are, [great people] come across like real people. So we're more inclined to respond to their requests," he writes.

For more:
- see John McKee's post at TechRepublic

Related Articles:
What to avoid when motivating the team
How to delegate more effectively
Words to avoid when talking to the CEO (slideshow)